Perhaps most damning in Roberts' reply - in light of media criticism of the Lancet's alleged exaggeration of civilian deaths - was his refutation of the claim that the uneven levels of violent unrest in Iraq compromised the accuracy of the figures. In fact the study not only accounted for this variability, it erred on the side of caution by excluding data from Fallujah where deaths were unusually high. Moreover, other violent hotspots - such as Ramadi, Tallafar and Najaf - were all passed over in the sample by random chance. This suggests that the actual total of civilian deaths is likely to be higher than 100,000. Indeed, it would make far more sense for the media to be criticising the report authors for under-estimating the number of deaths.
it's a good piece, and pretty much gives you all you need to know about the Lancet study. the comments on the comparison between how this study was received and how other studies (such as that on the Congolese war deaths) using the same methodology were received are particularly revealing
Biased guessing , pure and simple. They seem to have tried hard to keep their guess in the middle of the pack to lend some legitimacy to it, compared to the more extreme ones.
in the 1st gulf war, dod officials believed 200,000 people were killed...most of them civilians. that cums from the dod...i'm thinking its at least half that in this war...
a defining attribute of a government is that it has a monopoly on the legitimate exercise of violence...
Canidae wrote:Biased guessing , pure and simple. They seem to have tried hard to keep their guess in the middle of the pack to lend some legitimacy to it, compared to the more extreme ones.
did you actually read the article? and understand it?
R00k wrote:It is very interesting, just not extremely absorbing.
Good info though. :icon14:
the piece is really about media bias more than about the lancet report, though it relates things about the report i didn't know. i was absorbed enough to link it here anyway so yah boo sucks to you
Canidae wrote:Biased guessing , pure and simple. They seem to have tried hard to keep their guess in the middle of the pack to lend some legitimacy to it, compared to the more extreme ones.
